The Environment: Year In Review 2001

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This article was originally published in the Britannica Book of the Year, an annual print publication that
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On June 5, 2001, World Environment Day, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan announced a $21-million, four-year study of the condition of the global environment. With the participation of 1,500 scientists and many organizations, the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment would be the first comprehensive assessment of this kind ever attempted.

At a meeting held in Johannesburg, S.Af., Dec. 4–9, 2000, representatives from 122 governments had finalized an international treaty to reduce or eliminate the production and use of the persistent organic pollutants aldrin, chlordane, dieldrin, endrin, heptachlor, mirex, toxaphene, and hexachlorobenzene. Tropical countries were allowed to continue using DDT for malaria control until a suitable substitute became available. The phasing out of polychlorinated biphenyls would be gradual so that equipment containing them could remain in use until 2025. The treaty was opened for signature in Stockholm in May 2001 and would come into force once 50 countries had ratified it.

Eight people shared the $750,000 Goldman Environmental Prize at a presentation in San Francisco on April 23. The winners were Eugène Rutagarama of Rwanda, who worked to save his country’s last mountain gorillas; Yosepha Alomang of Indonesia for helping to reverse some of the damage caused by mining in Irian Jaya; Oscar Olivera of Brazil, who helped reverse the privatization of the Brazilian water industry that had led to sharp increases in water prices; Bruno Van Peteghem of New Caledonia for his opposition to nickel mining in the New Caledonia coral reef; Myrsini Malakou and Giorgos Catsadorakis of Greece, who helped establish the Prespa Park conservation zone in wetlands with the friendly collaboration of Albania, Macedonia, and Greece; and American journalists Jane Akre and Steve Wilson for their investigation into health risks from the agricultural use of recombinant bovine growth hormone.

On September 7 the European Union (EU) formally approved a directive on renewable energy. This required member states to ensure that 12% of gross internal energy consumption and 22.1% of electricity consumption would come from renewable sources by 2010.

Germany

On June 11 the federal government and leading energy companies signed a formal agreement to phase out nuclear power. The core of the agreement was a limit on the amount of power each of Germany’s nuclear power plants would be permitted to produce. On the basis of an average life of 32 years for each reactor, this would mean the newest reactor would have to close in about 2021. The government published a draft of the necessary legislation on July 9, and after a period for consultation, the cabinet approved it on September 5. As well as setting a limit to the life span of existing nuclear plants, the law required power generators to provide intermediate storage facilities close to their plants for spent fuel and banned all shipments of waste for reprocessing from 2005.

On June 6 Environment Minister Jürgen Trittin told journalists in Berlin that the government planned a major expansion of offshore wind-power generation. By 2030 offshore wind parks, with a total of 4,000 generators, would be generating between 75 and 80 terawatts of power annually. Two North Sea areas had been identified as suitable because they were clear of all marine- and bird-conservation areas. The required investment would be made possible by the German renewable energy support law, which guaranteed a price of €0.09 (about $0.08) per kilowatt-hour for wind power.

Spain

On September 5 Boliden Ltd., the Swedish-Canadian company operating the Los Frailes iron pyrite mine at Aznalcóllar in Andalusia, said production at the mine would cease immediately. The mine was the source of the 1998 leakage of waste upstream of the Coto Doñana National Park. The cost of cleaning up the leakage was estimated at €180 million (about $165 million), and compensation also would have to be paid. The company, which filed for bankruptcy in 2000, said these costs were a significant factor in the closure.

The United Kingdom

On July 18 the British government announced that there would be no further reprocessing of nuclear fuel at the Dounreay plant in Caithness, Scot. Reprocessing at Dounreay had been suspended in 1996 owing to an equipment failure, and almost 25 metric tons of spent fuel remained on-site. This would either be stored at Dounreay or be transported to Sellafield, Eng., for reprocessing.

Ukraine

On Dec. 15, 2000, the last of the four Chernobyl reactors was closed down permanently. In fact, reactor 3 had closed some weeks earlier for technical reasons and had to be restarted in order to be shut down formally. Pres. Leonid Kuchma had issued the command through a television link from the Ukraina Palace in Kiev. On April 26, 2001, the 15th anniversary of the accident at Chernobyl, Kuchma led a memorial service in Kiev. Meanwhile, scientists continued to study the long-term effects of low-level radiation released in the accident.

The United States

In its annual Toxic Release Inventory, published in April, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) reported that two-thirds of the over 3.5 billion kg (1 kg = 2.2 lb) of toxic chemicals released into the U.S. environment in 1999 came from hard-rock mining companies and operators of electric power plants. The highest releases were from Nevada and Utah, with nearly 530 million kg and 527 million kg, respectively; Arizona, 437 million kg; and Alaska, 196 million kg. Hard-rock mining companies released some 1.8 billion kg of chemicals into the air, land, and water, and electricity utilities released more than 527 million kg, mostly from stack emissions from coal-burning plants.

On April 25 the Senate unanimously passed legislation authorizing an annual expenditure of $200 million for cleaning up more than 500,000 abandoned industrial sites. On June 7 a Republican-led subcommittee of the House of Representatives rejected Pres. George W. Bush’s request for $2 million for preparatory studies on oil drilling in the Alaskan Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (AANW). Though on August 2 the House passed the energy bill by 240 votes to 189, complete with its provision allowing oil exploration and drilling in the refuge, on December 3 the Senate roundly rejected a bill (94–1) that would allow drilling in the AANW.

In the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks in the U.S., acrid smoke, soot, and ash from tons of pulverized debris complicated the recovery in New York City. The EPA reported that asbestos levels did not appear to be dangerous, but doctors recommended that people use special air filters and masks to avoid inhaling particulate matter even during the smallest clean-up operations.

Environmental Issues

Climate Change

The sixth conference of parties to the 1992 UN Convention on Climate Change was held at The Hague in November 2000. There was disagreement over the issues of carbon sinks and nuclear power. The umbrella group of countries, led by the U.S. and including Australia, Austria, Canada, Japan, New Zealand, Norway, Russia, Switzerland, and Ukraine, opposed any restriction on the means used to meet the cost of implementing the Kyoto Protocol. In particular, the group wanted forests (including forests planted long ago), as well as agricultural land, to be counted as sinks that absorb carbon dioxide. Although the EU agreed in the course of negotiations to limit the amount of carbon dioxide counted in this way, EU members rejected the offer on the ground that it would allow countries to claim reductions in greenhouse gas emissions without taking actual steps to reduce them. Negotiations continued during the winter.

On March 13, 2001, however, in a letter to four senior politicians, newly inaugurated President Bush said he would not accept mandatory controls on emissions of carbon dioxide because this would force utilities to switch from coal to gas, which was more expensive and would raise electricity prices. EPA administrator Christine Whitman confirmed the U.S. position on the protocol on March 27, though on March 29 Bush said he would remain open-minded on ways to address the problem of global warming. The EU sent a delegation to Washington to try to persuade Bush to change his mind. They met Whitman and other EPA officials on April 3, but the effort failed.

The conference of parties resumed in Bonn, Ger., on July 16 and concluded on July 27. Detailed rules for attaining Kyoto targets were finally accepted on July 23 by 178 countries (including Japan but not the U.S.) after the EU had made major concessions over carbon sinks. Rules for compliance were to be adopted at the first meeting of the parties after the protocol came into force. These rules would give early warning of potential noncompliance, and if limits were exceeded, the assigned amount would be reduced correspondingly in the next accounting period with a penalty 30% increase in the amount by which emissions had to be reduced. Three funds were pledged to assist less-developed countries and to help diversify the economies of countries that were heavily dependent on the oil industry, including Nigeria and Saudi Arabia. In another round of talks that was held in Marrakesh, Mor., and ended in November after two weeks of bargaining, negotiators reached agreement on the details of the treaty and hammered out a compliance scheme to ensure that pollution levels were met. Some 40 industrialized countries would be required to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases by an average of 5% below 1990 levels by 2012. Before the Kyoto Protocol could come into force, however, the pact needed to be ratified by 55 countries.

The 2,600-page latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was published on July 12. It estimated that temperatures might rise 1.4–5.8 °C (2.5–10.4 °F) by 2100 and assumed that carbon dioxide levels would reach 540–970 parts per million by that year. The report also concluded that the burning of fossil fuels and the emission of man-made chemicals “have contributed substantially to the observed warming over the last 50 years.”

Air Pollution

Figures published on June 5 by the German electricity-supply industry showed that sulfur dioxide emissions from power plants fell 92% between 1991 and 2000. Most of the improvement resulted from retrofitting desulfurization equipment in former East Germany and closing plants that could not be retrofitted economically.

The Norwegian Pollution Control Authority reported in August that acid-rain precipitation increased in 2000 over the southern and eastern part of the country. In some areas heavy rain and snowfall increased sulfur deposition to levels comparable to those of the late 1980s, causing damage rated from “marked” to “severe.”

In September the Mexican Metropolitan Environmental Commission unveiled a 10-year plan to improve air quality. This replaced a five-year program that had ended in 2000. Claudia Sheinbaum, Mexico City’s environment secretary, said the aim was to reduce levels of ozone and fine particulate matter.

Freshwater Pollution

In January thousands of fish were killed by cyanide that had spilled into the Siret River near the town of Lespezi, Rom., 340 km (210 mi) northeast of Bucharest, and nearly 60 people required hospital treatment after eating the contaminated fish. The cyanide level in the Siret and one of its tributaries peaked at 128 times acceptable levels. The spill was thought to have originated at a chemical factory owned by Metadet, and the company was immediately fined. The authorities released additional water into the rivers, and the cyanide concentration was quickly reduced.

On July 27 the U.S. House of Representatives voted to maintain the limits for arsenic in drinking water set by former president Bill Clinton’s administration. These reduced permitted levels from 50 to 10 parts per billion (ppb). The Bush administration asked a National Academy of Sciences panel to review the risks, meanwhile postponing any change. Their report, Arsenic in Drinking Water: 2001 Update, was released in September. The panel found that the dangers were higher than had been supposed and concluded the proposed 10-ppb limit, based on a study done in southwestern Taiwan, had underestimated risks. The previous study had estimated 0.8 extra cancer cases per 1,000 people, whereas the new panel estimated 1.3–3.7 extra cases, depending on whether it used the background cancer rate in Taiwan or the rate in the U.S. In October the EPA adopted the Clinton arsenic standard.

The Austrian Environment Ministry announced in August that testing for 100 pollutants at 2,000 sites showed that streams and rivers were becoming cleaner. Nitrates in groundwater continued to cause concern, with levels having risen at 13% of measuring stations.

Marine Pollution

On January 16 the Ecuadorian-registered cargo ship Jessica ran aground in a bay close to the harbour on San Cristóbal in the Galápagos Islands, spilling about 700,000 litres (1 litre = about 0.26 gal) of diesel and bunker fuel oil from its cargo of about 920,000 litres. About 200,000 litres were removed from the ship safely, and U.S. Coast Guard vessels arrived quickly to help in the effort to contain and recover the oil. The spilled oil formed a slick that reached the islands of Santa Cruz and Santa Fe but caused little harm. Attempts to remove the ship, lying at an angle of about 45° some 800 m (2,600 ft) from the shore, were defeated by heavy seas, and it was decided to make the wreck into an artificial reef.

The Helsinki Commission (Helcom) announced on August 24 that the amount of 47 hazardous substances entering the Baltic Sea had been halved since the late 1980s and that it would aim for discharges to be phased out completely by 2020. At a Helcom meeting in Copenhagen on September 10, transport and environment ministers from countries bordering the Baltic agreed on tighter rules to prevent oil spills. The need for new rules arose following a collision on March 28 between a cargo ship and a tanker that released about 2,700 metric tons of heavy fuel oil into the southwestern Baltic, causing the worst oil spill in the region in at least six years.

A meeting of parties to the Ospar Convention, held in Valencia, Spain, in late June, finalized an agreement on the discharge of oil into the northeast Atlantic. The oil content of produced water (a by-product of oil pumping) would be reduced by about 15%, calculated from a 2000 deadline. The meeting also added neodecanoic acid, ethenyl ester, and triphenyl phosphine to the list of substances to be phased out as a priority, bringing the total of such substances to 29.

Radioactive Waste

On March 29 the first shipment since 1997 of nuclear waste from the Cogema reprocessing facility at Cap de la Hague, France, arrived at a temporary storage site at Gorleben, Ger. The three-day journey was marked by antinuclear protests, and over 15,000 police were employed to guard the six armoured containers. On May 17 the second shipment, of about 54 spent fuel rods from Germany to Cap de la Hague, was halted for more than an hour by about 20 protesters who blocked the train at Amiens, France. About 15 protesters also blocked the rail track near Caen, France, and on May 16 some 40 protesters threw red smoke generators at the train near Strasbourg, France. Another such incident occurred in November when about 100 protesters attempted to block the motion of a train carrying nuclear waste from la Hague to Gorleben; they chained themselves to signal boxes and trees along the 600-km (375-mi) route.

Twelve Greenpeace protesters chained themselves to the track beneath an empty wagon at a railhead in Mannheim, Ger., on April 23 to demonstrate against the first shipment in three years of nuclear waste to Sellafield. Police removed the protesters and charged them with dangerous interference in rail transport. The nuclear waste left the next day.

Genetically Modified Food

The first meeting of the intergovernmental committee for the Cartagena Protocol took place in Montpellier, France, in December 2000. Representatives from more than 80 countries began developing detailed rules to govern the international movement of live genetically modified organisms (GMOs). The discussions covered information sharing, traceability of GMOs, packaging, handling and transport, national capacity building, and the formation of an expert advisory group. It was agreed to establish a pilot biosafety clearinghouse to give countries access to up-to-date lists of GMOs and information about national policies and regulations.

The UN Codex Alimentarius Commission agreed in July to require exporters of GM foods to undertake risk assessments, primarily of the foods’ allergenicity, before placing them on the market. Findings by the Royal Commission on Genetic Modification in New Zealand were published on July 30. The commission recommended that GM agriculture be introduced “selectively with appropriate care” and rejected outright the idea of a GM-free New Zealand as incompatible with the modern world and the nation’s future.

A report published on September 10 found that windborne pollen from corn (maize) plants genetically modified to express Bacillus turingiensis toxins posed a negligible risk to monarch butterflies. The study was prepared for the National Academy of Sciences by researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Iowa State University, the University of Minnesota, and private biotech companies.

Pesticides

An integrated crop production (ICP) plan announced on July 6 by Dutch Agriculture Minister Laurens Jan Brinkhorst aimed to reduce pesticide use in The Netherlands dramatically. Farmers would be required to adopt such measures as choosing pest-resistant crop varieties and growing “companion” plants. Farmers would be allowed to use pesticides only as a last resort, and in 2003 a tax would be imposed on pesticides. It was hoped that farmers would adopt the ICP plan voluntarily, but unless 90% of farmers had gained ICP certification by 2004, noncertified farms would be forbidden to use any pesticides.

On May 9 a report from the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) called on leading pesticide manufacturers to help pay for the safe destruction of an estimated 500,000 metric tons of obsolete pesticides that had been dumped in various parts of the world. The FAO reminded the Global Crop Protection Federation (GCPF) of its past commitment to pay up to $1 per litre or kilogram for safe destruction. Chris Waller, coordinator of the GCPF obsolete stocks team, said the industry was waiting for the FAO to devise a scheme that would ensure that money was used to deal only with products made or distributed by the companies contributing to the fund.

Electromagnetic Fields

It was reported in March that a study had found that 0.5% of children exposed to electromagnetic fields of 0.4 microteslas or more could double their risk of contracting leukemia before age 15, from 1 in 1,400 to 1 in 700. The study, commissioned by the U.K. National Radiological Protection Board, analyzed 3,247 childhood leukemia cases in Europe, North America, and New Zealand. Epidemiologist Sir Richard Doll of the Cancer Studies Unit at the University of Oxford said that taken by themselves these results might be due to chance, but there was a possibility that intense and prolonged exposure to magnetic fields could increase the risk of leukemia in children.

On September 11 the results of a study by researchers led by Tom Sorahan at the University of Birmingham, Eng., was published in Occupational and Environmental Medicine. The study found that workers in the electricity industry were no more likely to develop brain tumours than the general population. The study looked at the causes of death of some 84,000 electricity workers in England and Wales and found the death rate from brain cancer similar to that for the general population.